New Interview Online with Fedor "CrownUpGuy" Holz

22 year old German poker prodigy is certainly the man of the moment as far as big live scores go. In the past 12 months, the boyish looking phenom has racked up over $16.5m in live tourney winnings, including winning a WSOP bracelet in this year's High Roller for One Drop for almost $5m. The boy-wonder recently took some questions from Lee Davy at calvinayre.com on his success, his plans for the future.

In the interview Holz speaks at length about how he has developed his poker and life skills over the past three years or so through various methods. One of Fedor's key learning grounds is his close circle of poker friends, a group they call "TGK" (a mixture of some of their name apparently) who he has known since he had nothing who know either play high stakes online or have quit poker and are successful in other spheres. Of his part in the group Holz says,

"I am like a sponge. I am not an inventor. These guys are smarter than me in a lot of areas, particular when it comes to creating something. What brings us all together is we all have something special to bring to the group. My part in it is bouncing certain ideas, and being very comprehensive in lots of different areas. I grasp things very quickly. But I won’t be the guy leading the discovery and finding new things. I think that’s why people like to talk to me. They become smarter and more efficient. This is how our group works so well. We bounce ideas around, and we get to a point much quicker than we would working on our own.”

Holz also talks at length about the value of mental coaching saying that "It’s an outstanding way to sort your thoughts and point you in the right direction. 5, 10, 20% more in line with what you want to achieve and where you want to go"

As to the future, Fedor doesn't see his in poker long term as he wants to give back in some way and says about poker that "It only takes. It’s very selfish. There is no lasting place for it in my life to do this for a living.”, although he does go on to say that just because poker isn't necessarily going to be the thing he does as a career going forward, that he'll still be on the circuit playing events, just not to the intense degree to which he has been over the past 4 years.

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